At least according to the latest Kauffman survey of economics bloggers by Tim Kane. Here’s the word cloud of responses when the bloggers (including me) were asked for up to five adjectives to describe the U.S. economy in Q4 2011: Comparing this to the last survey in July, the good news is that “vulnerable” has gotten smaller. The [...]
Archive for October, 2011
The U.S. Economy is Weak, Uncertain, and Fragile
Posted in Economy, Energy, tagged Economy, Macroeconomics on October 31, 2011 | 5 Comments »
Is Our Luck Running Out on Oil Supplies?
Posted in Economy, Energy, Macroeconomics, tagged Energy, Macroeconomics, Oil on October 23, 2011 | 4 Comments »
In an excellent new paper, Jim Hamilton asks whether the “phenomenal increase in global crude oil production over the last century and a half” reflects technological progress or good fortune in finding new reserves. The two aren’t completely distinct, of course. Better technology helps find more resources. But the heart of the question remains: have we been [...]
Happy Anniversary, Tax Reform
Posted in Budget, Politics, tagged Politics, Taxes on October 22, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Twenty-five years ago today, President Ronald Reagan signed the Tax Reform Act of 1986 into law. Happy silver anniversary, tax reform! Over at the Tax Policy Center, Len Burman and Gene Steuerle, both Treasury staffers at the time, and Howard Gleckman, who covered the proceedings for BusinessWeek, offer personal reflections on how TRA86 happened and [...]
Bank Marketing When Interest Rates Are Almost Zero
Posted in Business, Macroeconomics, tagged Banks, Capital One, Interest Rates, Marketing on October 13, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Judging by all the ads I saw on my commute this morning, Capital One has rolled out a new marketing campaign. At least half-a-dozen ads on my Metro car announced that Capital One offers interest rates that are five times higher than offered by their competitors: And what is that 5x interest rate? Just one percent. Such are [...]
Netflix and the Benefit of Flip Flopping
Posted in Business, Technology, tagged Netflix, Sunk Costs on October 11, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix, gave subscribers some good news yesterday: We are going to keep Netflix as one place to go for streaming and DVDs. This means no change: one website, one account, one password … in other words, no Qwikster. As a long time subscriber, I can only say Hallelujah. But I am [...]
Why Did Sargent and Sims Win a Nobel Prize?
Posted in Macroeconomics, tagged Macroeconomics, Nobel on October 10, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Because they developed methods to help distinguish between cause and effect in the macroeconomy. The Royal Swedish Academy of Science released a very readable account of their contributions here. Here’s the introduction: The economy is constantly affected by unanticipated events. The price of oil rises unexpectedly, the central bank sets an interest rate unforeseen by borrowers and [...]
Some Economics of Somali Piracy
Posted in International, Microeconomics, tagged Piracy, Somalia on October 9, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Jeffrey Gettleman has penned a fascinating piece about the 388-day ordeal of two British sailors taken hostage by Somali pirates. Writing in the New York Times Magazine, he recounts how Paul and Rachel Chandler sailed off course between the Seychelles and Tanzania and found their sailboat boarded by ten pirates. Their first order of business? [...]
How Apple Sends Back Technology from the Future
Posted in Business, Technology, tagged Apple on October 6, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Over on Quora, an anonymous author has a fascinating post about another dimension of Apple’s and Steve Jobs’ brilliance–managing its supply chain: Apple has access to new component technology months or years before its rivals. This allows it to release groundbreaking products that are actuallyimpossible to duplicate. Remember how for up to a year or so [...]
How Fast Does the Stock Market Forget False News? About Seven Days
Posted in Business, Finance, tagged Finance, Stock Market, UAL on October 5, 2011 | 2 Comments »
The New York Federal Reserve just posted an entertaining analysis of an “Internet blooper” that struck UAL, the parent company of United Airlines a few years ago. As authors Carlos Carvalho, Nicholas Klagge, and Emanuel Moench note in a blog post: On September 8, 2008, a six-year-old article about the 2002 bankruptcy of United Airlines’ parent [...]
Solow on Keynes and Uncertainty
Posted in History, Macroeconomics, tagged Keynes, Macroeconomics, Uncertainty on October 4, 2011 | 3 Comments »
Over at the New Republic, Bob Solow offers a thoughful review of Sylvia Nasar’s new book, Grand Pursuit: The Story of Genius. Along the way, Solow provides a characteristically clear explanation of what he views as John Maynard Keynes most important contribution: Back then [in the 1930s], serious thinking about the general state of the economy was [...]
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